


Sun-Touched, Stone-Blind

by wretchen



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-09
Updated: 2015-04-26
Packaged: 2018-03-17 00:59:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3509246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wretchen/pseuds/wretchen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The between-plot squabbles and less notable adventures of Inquisitor Finn Cadash.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. City Girls

“That’s weird!”  


“What’s weird?” Finn whipped the unruly strands of hair from her eyes so she could glance back at Sera, tall and blonde and graceful on a borrowed Taslin Strider. It’s honeyed coat made a lovely backdrop to Sera’s red kit and substantial thighs.  


“Little dwarf like you on that big hart, yeah? Looks funny.” She paused and nudged her horse into a fiercer trot. The wind did them both justice: Twin flowing manes and long legs. They made a fetching pair. Finn despaired of ever complimenting a mount the way Sera did that mare. “And not just because your stubby ‘lil legs barely go round it.”  


Ignoring the dig at her height, Finn slowed her mount and nervously touched the pretty thing’s handsome antlers. “Does that...bother you?” The Inquisition had introduced her to a kind of cultural sensitivity that had been unnecessary in Carta life. It was hard to sort out what was alright and what was distasteful. She wobbled as the hart drew to a stop, still a mite unsteady in the saddle. It was a long way to the ground.  


“Bother—what? Me? No!” Sera laughed as she brought her horse forward. “Course not. You’ll have to talk to Solas MacStuffypants if you want someone to whine about elven culture. ‘Sides, the Dalish don’t _own_ any of their beasties, not really. Ride your hart. She’s a pretty one. Just looks funny, is all.”  


Finn considered this. “I’ve named her _Anabelle,_ which I understand is Orlesian in origin and suits her perfectly. Her coat looks like a court gown.” She said this with relish, stroking Anabelle’s fine neck, but realized too late that while a dwarf riding a hart might not offend her elven friend, giving her an Orlesian name just might. What with the multiple genocidal campaigns and all. Elves seemed to offend easily—or at least the Dalish did. In contrast, dwarves tended to roll with the punches. (The punches were usually their own.)  


Sera was unperturbed, but she spared a lingering glance between Anabelle’s hind legs. “You _might_ wanna rethink that.”  


“Oh.” Finn colored. “I didn’t think to check.”  


Sera gave her a dubious look.  


“I’m from the city!”  


“So am I, right? But I had the good sense to leave!” Sera tossed her tow head once and ambled forward. Her horse whinnied in expertly timed, playful disdain. Finn decided then and there to buy the horse for Sera. They were too well-suited to separate. Master Dennet could find the room.  


“Which city?” Sera asked after a spell.  


“Starkhaven.”  


“ _Really?_ ”  


“What, don’t I seem the type?”  


“You are sort of. Um. Coarse.” Sera appraised her with those narrow hazel eyes. “But even the most pompous city has its little people. In your case, literally, huh?”  


Finn chuckled. “Actually, I have a feeling your Red Jenny would mess with my family if she could. Or um, she probably--if it occurred to her, that is. House Cadash is not...well, we’re little, and we’re coarse, but we’re not exactly _little,_ as you put it.”  


“Not even you?”  


The question caught Finn by surprise. Sera was really too clever by half. “I. Um.” The Inquisitor blew air between her lips, searching. “I’m awkwardly illegitimate. The Carta takes itself very seriously up here. I guess because no one else will, down in Orzammar. Not that I’ve ever been. But it’s the deshyr opinions that matter to them, even though they won’t admit it, and it’s embarrassing if your dad is the wrong person. I hear it’s worse underground.”  


“Sounds like the same shit as everywhere else.”  


“Yeah.” The wind picked up, highlighting the heavy silence and further mussing Finn’s curls. She might have worn a hat, if only to buffer against an unschooled expression.  


“So what was your job?” Sera’s tone was carefully casual, but there was a tight edge to her question.  


“Quietly passing off small amounts of illegal lyrium to not very important clients. Mostly mages. Occasionally templars, which was sort of funny. Believe it or not, much of the smuggling business is hellishly boring. Sometimes I had to stab someone. As it happens, I’m really good at hiding daggers in my chemise, so don’t get any ideas.”  


Sera shot Finn a look, but she relaxed. “Uck. I don’t think _that_ highly of you.”  


Finn snickered. “Oh, I have no illusions. Still, it would be awkward to employ me in general thuggishness, you see, because my aunt is really important and they can’t just pretend I’m nobody. Almost as awkward as having me around in the first place.”  


“But you were expendable enough to send to the Conclave and probably get murdered.” Sera didn’t mean it the way it sounded, but the truth stung nonetheless.  


Finn bit her lip. “Yes, well, everyone in the Carta’s expendable. Some more than others. Me, a lot. You’re right. I doubt anyone thought I was coming back.”  


“But you didn’t get murdered!” From Sera, this was real encouragement.  


“But I didn’t get murdered! Not for lack of trying, you know.” The mark on Finn’s palm throbbed in response, its green glow visible even under the delicate leather of her riding gloves. She watched it whorl blankly. “I didn’t get murdered at all.”  


“Come on. That’s mean. Coryphee-spit did his best.”  


Sera’s almost-pronouncement of his name sent tiny bolts of terror through Finn’s body, but she swallowed hard and chose to ignore them.  


“His best just wasn’t good enough.” Finn shrugged, catching an air of mischief in the subsequent change of wind. “And neither is yours!” The Inquisitor smacked Anabelle into a sudden, reckless gallop. It was a cheap, graceless change of subject. Sera raced after her anyway, hollering in protest.


	2. The Dress

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A successful Inquisition is half disembowelment and half looking the part. Finn has accordingly made an investment.

The dress was heavy. Between the stiff bodice (with daggers sewn into the boning), five or six petticoats (with daggers weighing down the hems), startling bustle (daggers), and trailing sleeves (also with daggers), the sheer bulk of the thing should have dragged the pudgy little dwarf to the ground. Or so it seemed to the Iron Bull, who rarely bothered with armor, much less an Orlesian gown. Even so, Finn carried the thing well. The deep violet tones of the skirt lent her a regal air—uncommon in his not-so-genteel Inquisitor.

“ _Well?_ ” The little dwarf twirled for emphasis, clearly enjoying herself. The Inquisition’s insignia was embroidered in brilliant gold thread, glittering just beneath her freckle-spattered decolletage. The look was punctuated by matching earrings and necklace, intricate and gold and obviously dwarven in origin. Orlesian fashions were clearly the inspiration, not the template.

“Perfect. But somehow I doubt you need confirmation of it.”

Finn glanced into the mirror behind her, patting her precarious pile of curls. “True. But it’s nice to hear. Do you see another comb around here? I think this is liable to fall.”

“Sharpened to a point, or dull?”

A honk of laughter. “Don’t be silly. _All_ of my combs are sharpened to a point. Especially the particularly bejewelled ones. I do all my best stabbing in Orlais. Ah!” She shoved aside the trappings of her toilette and snatched up a comb, bone and intricate gold filigree. Bull took it from her fingers and deftly twisted her the stray coils into neat submission at the back of her neck.

“You’re awfully good at that,” Finn said, impressed, “for someone with no hair. Well, not much.”

“You’re surprised that I’m good at tying things into place?”

“Oh, stop.”

Bull chuckled, long and low. “I won’t.”

She swatted him in playful outrage. “ _That_ was clearly an order.”

He met her gaze steadily and marked a pregnant pause before murmuring: “Mm, no. I know what an order from you sounds like.” Finn squirmed as he trailed a finger up her lightly freckled arm. Too easy.

She gulped once and abruptly turned. “We don’t have time for. For.” She struggled to fasten the back of the gown. “Can you—?”

The Iron Bull knelt, examining the odd, ingenious mechanism that closed the gown. Orlesians poured their talents toward strange inventions, lovely things the dress did for Finn’s figure aside. “You know, this isn’t really my forte. Leliana would have helped you. Or Josephine.” His large fingers, usually so nimble, felt dumb in the presence of such tiny hooks and laces.

Finn shot him a wicked glance over her shoulder. “Do you have any idea how much of of these blasted things costs?”

“You know, it’s not a purchase I’ve ever considered. A lot?”

“ _A lot_ , a lot. I can’t imagine how Orlesian nobles stay Orlesian nobles if they have to buy this get up several times over every season. Anyways, Josephine and I agreed that it was a necessary expense.”

“And Leliana didn’t? I’m surprised.” Get the woman drunk enough and she went into literal raptures over dancing shoes. Why wouldn’t she want the boss in her finest?

“Believe it or not, she doesn’t think I’m very good at balls. I can’t imagine where that notion comes from—obviously I’m terribly refined.” Finn spared a mopey glance in her looking glace. “Besides, our fashion senses are _not compatible_. She’d never have let me have this made in violet. Which is rather unfair,” she sniffed, gesturing to her fiery crown of hair. “I’m pretty much always wearing Inquisitorial red.”

“Sometimes more than others, but I guess blood isn’t an Orlesian fashion statement. So you don’t want to give Leliana time to complain. Why not your co-conspirator then?”

“She doesn’t know about the daggers.”

“Ah.” Bull tightened the last her laces. “There. I hope this is easier to get you out of than it was to get you in.”

The Inquisitor shot him a positively nasty grin in response. “Oh it _is_. And um, I say that not only to titillate. Should things come to a brawl to night—and I dare say they will—all I need do is pull these two ribbons at my hips and the whole skirt will fall away! Form _and_ function!”

Bull eyed her steadily. Her chest heaved with excitement as she admired her plan in the mirror. If she was trying to fit in with the Orlesian high brows, half-disrobing to disembowel someone in the middle of their party was probably not the way to go, but he wasn’t about to burst her bubble. “Form, sure. You’re only bringing me along to carry the damn thing, aren’t you?”

Finn found herself to be suddenly very engrossed her refection. “I thought perhaps you could drape it on your horns.”

“ _Finn._ ”

She kissed him suddenly, a jump shot she’d grown good at in the months spent in each other’s...companionship. Short even for a dwarf, it was no easy task, and the considerable and unfamiliar weight of her gown threw off her aim. It was lucky neither of them particularly minded a clunk to the jaw. Bull caught her grudgingly, then obliged to the hungry crush of her lips. Her bare feet dangled, knocking an awkward rhythm against his knees. They parted just a hair--she breathless, he just a little mollified.

“I am _not_ a hanger.”

“Of course not. No one would ever suggest such a thing.” She wiggled her way to the floor, landing in a graceless heap. Bull felt a built guilty for dropping her. Height differences were complicated. And that fair skin bruised so easily…

“You know, I’m pretty hard to manipulate.”

“Are you?” Her voice dripped with honey and wine—false innocence, a suggestion of what was to come. Sex or bloodshed? Bull wasn’t sure, but it made him sweat. “Come on. We don’t want to be any later than is fashionable. Or, you know, than the guy we’re trying to kill.”

She took his arm—an uncomfortable upwards reach, but sweet in its odd way—and stepped into her shoes. These, at least, Leliana would approve. They headed for the door.


End file.
